Man on death row fights conviction after ‘hypnotised’ witness identified him

Charles Flores has been on death row for 26 years, after he was convicted of the 1998 murder of Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Black in Texas.

However, he has always maintained his innocence, and his case is one of the most bizarre in recent history.

Why? Because his conviction relied heavily on testimony from Black’s neighbor, Jill Barganier, whose account changed after she underwent forensic hypnosis.

Now, after exhausting all his appeals, Flores has one last chance at freedom: a petition to the Supreme Court.

NBC News recently sat down with Flores in his first national TV interview, where he claimed to have had no part in the killing.

Speaking with reporter Dan Slepian, Flores said: ‘I’m getting set up. I had nothing to do with the murder of Mrs Black.’

So, what happened?

In January 1998, William Black returned home to find his property had been burgled and his wife, Betty, had been fatally shot.

It was later revealed that the Blacks had been hiding drug money for their son, who was incarcerated at the time.

After the shooting, a handful of neighbors told police that they had witnessed two men get out of a Volkswagen Beetle with a distinctive print and enter the Black’s home.

One day later, Black’s next-door neighbor identified a man named Richard Childs as the driver. Childs later confessed to murder and took a plea for 35 years in prison. After serving 17 years, Childs was released on parole in 2016.

Five days after Childs was arrested, neighbor Barganier was taken into the police station to create a composite sketch of the passenger. While she identified Childs as the driver, she didn’t identify Flores, who was shown in two lineups.

Barganier was then hypnotised by a police officer. During the session, Barganier said the passenger was a white male with long hair and a medium build. This did not fit the description of Flores, who was described as ‘Hispanic, short, stocky, with then shaved hair.’

Before the hypnosis ended, the officer told her that she would ‘be able to recall more of the events as time goes on.’

However, it was later reported by Houston Public Media that not all rules were followed when recording the session, stating that a Texas law was broken. Back when the hypnosis technique was allowed, the state didn’t allow officers involved in the case to be part of a hypnosis session.

Then, 13 months later, Bargainer made a 360 statement during Flores’ trial, identifying him as the passenger in the Beetle and telling the court she was ‘100% sure’.

This bombshell comment immediately condemned Flores, even though no physical or DNA evidence tied him to the murder.

Additionally, while Flores didn’t pull the trigger, he still received the death sentence under Texas law for being an accomplice, and he was convicted under the law of parties.

This is despite him having an alibi — Flores maintains that he was making breakfast with his wife at the time of the murder — and not matching the accomplice description.

NBC reported the car used in the murder was hidden behind Flores’ home. He set it on fire two days later and fled to Mexico.

When he returned he led police on a chase and crashed his car, being taken to hospital where he again tried to escape.

When Slepian questioned why he had fled if he was innocent, he said: ‘I’m here to tell you that you also run when you are afraid.

‘I had that thought: “They’re going to kill me, they’re going to kill me”. And you know what? I was right. Where am I?’, as he sat on death row.

Flores came within five days of execution in 2016 but was issued a stay after he put forward evidence from psy­chol­o­gy pro­fes­sor Steven Lynn, whose research linked the hypnosis method used with the cre­ation of false mem­o­ries.

An investigation in 2020 by Dallas Morning News found investigative hypnosis had been used in at least 1,700 cases in Texas since the 1980s, resulting in prison convictions and even death sentences.

After experts raised concerns, the method was banned from criminal proceedings as the process was acknowledged to be unreliable. However, it did not apply retroactively and Flores’ conviction stood.